


By God(s) And Country(World)Men

by audi



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types, Thor (Movies)
Genre: Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Spoilers, Fix-It of Sorts, Gen, M/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-05-13
Updated: 2019-05-14
Packaged: 2020-03-02 16:20:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,243
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18814549
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/audi/pseuds/audi
Summary: An attempt at a maybe fix it of sorts.Spoilers for those who may not have watched it yet. Maybe major character deaths.





	1. The End

**Author's Note:**

> AN: I know where I want this to end up, I just don't know if I can actually push myself to go through the story I have in my head.

The world is not burning.

It's very bloody, though, and Clint would have blinked at the sight of so much blood outside of a body mingled with ashes of what used to be fucking aliens that even his alien friends and allies consider as otherworldly if he could actually process what was happening.

Which he wasn't.

Or couldn't.

The world has gone to hell and back, and then actually back to hell, and then just fucking _finally_ back.

Without Natasha. Without Tony.

And he should be ecstatic, which he is, really, _really_. His family is back, the people who were ash-ed are back, and one Mad Purple Titan is gone, but from where Clint's standing, aside from a decapitated arm of maybe one of Thor's warriors if he takes into consideration the solid gold vambrace with wings and horns interlocked engraved in the metal, there really is no victors in any war.

"Dyggr."

Clint fucking jumps maybe more than an inch in the air, and it is only by self-preservation that he does not stab Thor when he manages to whirl around.

It all happened pretty quickly, and he's sure no one even saw, but he knows he'll never live it down if the other Avengers even caught whiff of how their resident god managed to slip past Hawkeye, assassin extraordinaire.

Natasha --

Tony would --

_Fuck_.

"Thor, buddy, you really should not have done that," he starts, looking up (and up) to his friend's face, and he wants to take a step back.

Thor's eyes were white. Or. Light. Thor's eyes were _light_ , like staring into pure lightning before it strikes. Clint does not know why and how his eyes have become as such, but what he is certain of is that Mother Earth really cannot take any more of these gods and titans wreaking havoc on her.

Besides, he's friends with Thor. Clint's a little bit on the good side of 50% that Thor will not kill him on sight. Literally.

"Um, Thor."

"Yes, my friend?" And Thor turns his head to meet Clint's gaze head on. It is unnerving, always, to see this much power made flesh. God-flesh, sure, but to be contained in an actual form is...unnerving.

Sometimes, Clint and the others forget that Thor is an actual god. No matter how Steve says _just Asgardian_ , _just_ alien, and even Tony, when his scientific, practical mind can compromise only with demi-god because _god_ , gods, cannot exist.

"You might want to tune down the eyes-thing?" Cling manages to wrangle out of his throat, gesturing with his hand.

Thor blinks, before he shakes his head. "I apologize, my friend, I feel too much at the moment."

Clint nods. There really isn't much one can say to that.

"And he really shouldn't have to do anything about who he actually is, to be very honest."

Both men turn, and Clint is greeted with a sight of a pegasus? With a woman on top.

He blinks, while Thor lets out a laugh.

"Come, Valkyrie, Clint means nothing of the sort."

A snort, and she dismounts, a hand straying at the sides of the face of her ride. "And that is why your brother hates your love for these mortal friends of yours -- you give them too much acquiescence you forget who you are."

A beat, and Clint could feel the air changing. Charging.

"I am a warrior first, and a protector of the realms, second."

It's like the woman -- Valkyrie, and wow, really? -- has a death wish. Clint wants to take a step back and then run.

"No, your Majesty. You are _Thor_ first, and _brother_ second."

A foreboding silence before a thundering crash, and all Clint saw was white for three heartbeats. Mortal heartbeats. He wants to not die because he has his family back. He really, really, really does not want to be in the middle of a god versus Valkyrie match.

"You overstep, Valkyrie."

"No, Your Majesty. I merely remind." And then she turns back on her steed, and was off.

It was like nothing happened, except the ground beneath them were charred and sparks were littered on and off.

Clint let out a breathe he did not realize he was holding.

"It is all I have."

He looks at Thor, so familiar and yet so different all the same. This was not the god who saved Clint and the Avengers more time than any of them cared to admit. This Thor looks...diminished. Lost. Gone.

What happens to gods when they mourn?

"Memories are all that's left for me." And at this, Thor turns to meet Clint's eyes, where before there was electric blue, now there is only pure white that no mortal should have to endure, and he nods, and turns his back, and walks away.

Clint follows with his gaze, until Thor takes to the skies and is gone.


	2. What's One Thousand Five Hundred Years or so over Eight Years

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thor and Loki Odinson. Loki and Thor Odinson. Odinsons.
> 
> For all Thor's bravado in Sakaar, for all his speech about letting Loki go his way, in truth, he does not how to be without his brother.
> 
> The past years were just a breath for the Aesir, but it felt like a lifetime for him. It isn't even the longest they have ever been apart. But this. This feels final. 
> 
> And Thor has never really done good with final.

Her life has come to this, she thinks, as she drinks in the sight of her nephew, who in turn is drinking the sight of the Avengers ( _the Avengers mother fu--)_  .

 

"But he's  _Thor!"_ Peter turns, arms outstretched and hands open, gesturing towards the lounging god ( _god, there is a god in the same room as she is and she can climb him like a tree, she can lick him like melted ice cream on the hottest summer day --)_ who, in turn was looking at Peter softly. 

 

Or benevolently. 

 

Or however millenia-old gods look at...their supplicants? Worshipers? Mortal children who talk non-stop in veneration?

 

"Well, Queens --" Steve Rogers, Captain America, oh  _Lord_ look at that package god May feels like she will spontaneously combust and it really is not good for her mental health to be at this state, to be in any state other than  _processing._ She's lived the past five years in grief, mourning, and stuck. She's tried to move forward, and sometimes it worked, but most of the time she sees nothing but people being turned to ash, about people disintegrating into nothing, about them being blown by the wind.

 

"He's god! Or.  _A_ god. Right, Thor, Sir? Or, Lord? Lord Thor? God Thor? Lord God Thor? King Thor? King Lord Thor? King God Thor? King Thor God?"

 

May blinked at the verbal diarrhea of her nephew. And then blinked again because she heard about what happened to Thor's kingdom (or planet, but who's wanting to be politically correct, really?), and the remaining of his people. "Um," she starts, ready to run across the room and throw herself on top of Peter. 

 

"Thor is fine, child."

 

She breathes in relief.

 

"Oh. Okay. Sir. Lord. Um. Yes. So, I mean, why didn't we let Thor use the gauntlet? He's a god. He's more than Thanos, right? Unless Titans are like  _more_ than gods?"

 

There was a resounding silence. 

 

"I mean sure, Mister Hulk is really strong and stuff, but Lord Thor is a god. Like. Science experiment versus god? It's a no brainer...? Right? Even if he seems a little bigger than we're used to? But this is just his physical body, it really isn't him, in his entirety. Right? I mean, at least that's what Father James said about God -- but that's applicable here too. Since in Norse myth their tree isn't really a tree, so the gods aren't really how we see them, our minds are just giving us a projection of of them that our minds can process...?" he trailed off, when he realized that everyone in was staring at him a little bit slack jawed, except said god, who was actually smiling like he meant it. 

 

May was still blinking, not really understanding when her nephew had the exact time to go to Church. Even if they weren't Catholics. 

 

"Well." Bruce Banner starts, head inclined and his brows furrowed. His arm was in a sling, and it kept making abortive gestures, still unused to its uselessness.

 

She thinks it might be funny, the way the creature that broke Harlem once upon a time flounders now, like a fish out of water. But then, what happened to Harlem is no joke, what happened to the Universe five years past is no joke, the loss that these heroes have suffered is no joke. 

 

"They thought me unstable, little spider." Thor starts, drawling, "And they are afraid of my dead." 

 

May stilled, breath held, unsure what has put her on edge, but they -- everyone on earth -- forgets that Thor  _is_ a god. No matter how adorable they all think he is, a golden retriever puppy who is bright and big and strong but gentle and kind-hearted. And Thor is. There is something about him that is so inherently good, so disarming, so unlike his brother Loki, all angles and sharp turns, a shadowed luminescence that speaks of madness (or sorrow and grief, and suffering, because May worked in soup kitchens, saw the eyes of veterans who chose to leave everything and live on the streets).

 

"Thor, buddy," Steve says, recovering, reaching out, but Thor only shook his head. May noted how the doctor-sorcerer shifted a bit and lowered his arms. 

 

"I am unstable, my friend, about that I do not disagree. I carry too much weight, with no weight at all -- no kingdom, no people, no friends I have known since I could hold a wooden sword, no father I could disagree, no mother I could find succor, and no..." here he breaks, and May wonders, how a god could find humanity. "No shadow, no whisperer, no trickster. No brother." He looked into the eyes of every person in the room who, in turn, were almost paralyzed with the pain the god was manifesting. 

 

Earth has only seen Loki as a villain. It's been fifteen years ago, give or take, and New York has recovered. Even the people has moved forward, mostly, and it's certainly dwarfed by what Thanos himself has done. But Thor has had more than a decade and a half with Loki, the god of mischief and lies. He has had more of Loki than the insanity of New York.

 

"I am not someone, some _thing_ , they can control, young Peter Parker, nor would I be controlled, and they are afraid of it. Humans,  _mortals_ , mayflys, my brother used to call you, nothing, my father considers you, and yet it is my brother is the villain."

 

Nobody had anything to say to that, not even her good nephew, 

 

"He was tortured."

 

Every head that could turned to the cool, unattached voice. Something-cloud, May thought. Cumulus? Nimbus?

 

"What?" Thor asked, now sitting straight.

 

The woman, or robot? shrugged one shoulder. "Your brother, Loki, when he fell to the Void, the Other found him and my father..."she trailed of, glancing up to meet Thor's eyes for a moment, before glancing off. "Thanos thought it funny, to play with a godling, a jotun-godling, he called him. After he was done with your brother, he planned to throw him at your father's feet, broken by his own hand." She paused, her robotic arm clenching and unclenching into a fist. "It was the only way he could have a sliver of hold in your brother's mind. You are gods, and my father was just a Titan."

 

"...So, wait, are you saying that Loki was mind controlled, too? By Thanos? Is that what you're saying, Nebula?" There was a note of hysteric in Clint's tone, as if the very foundations of his existence were being undone. May shook her head as well. She's beginning to think this is not going to go well for any of them, and even more for Thor. Thor, who is grinding his teeth so hard she could practically hear it. 

 

Nebula pursed her lips. "Not  _necessarily._ Not as you were, if I understand you correctly?" Clint nodded, and she nodded back. "Thanos had no stones yet, then. It would take too much of his own power, too much for the Other, to hold control over the mind of a godling, half jotun or not, or even more so --"

 

"Half jotun?" Thor cut off the narrative, his entire attention now on Nebula. May half wonders how Nebula could withstand it, it was the first time she saw him concentrate on one thing since she met him less than a day ago. 

 

Nebula only tilted her head, as if confused. "Yes, a jotun-godling."

 

"We are talking about my brother, yes? Loki? My  _adopted_ brother?" And now it seems Clint's hysteria is Thor's. 

 

The other woman just nodded. "My father said," and here she took a deep breath, "His lines were Laufey-King, Thanos said, but his god-hood is Odin's. Same as yours." She paused, taking a second before she stood. The room was silent as she approached Thor. "Loki Odinson is Odinson, a product of Laufey posing as a barmaid and Odin took the form of an unnamed jotun trader."

 

Thor took a deep breath, his mouth opening and closing with no sound. He swallowed, audibly, "Did -- Loki, did he know?"

 

Nebula shook her head. "No. Thanos had plans for him. He was...powerful."

 

Thor nodded his head, chuckling slightly, and it made the hairs of May's arm rise. The tinge of hysteria is more pronounced now, something undeniable. "Yes. Yes, he was."

 

And then Thor stood, and headed for the door towards the terrace, and jumped, and all May could do was watch. 

 

She notices that no one in the room has also moved. 


End file.
